Top Artists – Led Zeppelin

Letter of the Week – “I’m still listening to the copy you sold me every few days, and loving it…”

More of the Music of Led Zeppelin

Reviews and Commentaries for Led Zeppelin II

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently:

Hey Tom, 

I noticed that a Super Hot of Zep 2, and now a Nearly White Hot, both sold out within hours of you listing them, despite some jaw-dropping prices.

Meanwhile, I’m still listening to the copy you sold me every few days, and loving it at least as much as I did on the first play. I’m still wincing at the price, but also feeling very glad you reached out to me about it. So, thanks again.

Aaron

Aaron,

Just think how many times you will play that record in your lifetime. A few bucks a play, for an experience like that, what a bargain!

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Letter of the Week – “All I can say is that it was a “Holy Shit!” moment for EVERYONE in the room.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Led Zeppelin Available Now

One of our good customers had this to say about some Hot Stampers he purchased recently:

Hey Tom, 

Thanks again!

Got the White Hot ELP s/t Friday afternoon as I was leaving for a weekend at the Capital Audio Fest in Bethesda Maryland but had no time to listen to it at home so brought it and the Led Zep 2 White Hot I bought from you a year or so back with me to the show with the intention of playing it on some of the crazy systems being demo’ed at the show.

The majority of participants demo their systems with Mofi and other heavy vinyl reissues. Rarely will you hear old vinyl.

Saturday night in the “main room” where VAC and Von Schweikert were partnering and demo-ing their million dollar system, there was a presentation by Greg Weaver (a friend of mine) and the theme was great sounding prog rock.

After a few records – all reissues, Greg turns to the 30 or so of us and asked what we wanted to hear next. The guy behind me shouts out “Zep 2 Robert Ludwig hot mix!” and of course he didn’t have it but that was my opening and I took it – “I have it upstairs and happy to bring it down!”

Greg of course said “sure!” so I ran up to my room and grabbed the Zep 2 AND the ELP I just got from you but never played.

The Zep 2 was a revelation to many – some people moved closer to take it all in, it was everything you would have expected and beyond, an unforgettable highlight for all! One guy had me pose with him holding the record after it was done, lol!

Greg was excited to see the ELP too and put it on next. He gave a little history about the band and its members and then dropped the needle.

All I can say is that it was a “Holy Shit!” moment for EVERYONE in the room. Maybe, no…without a doubt, the best record I and many there had ever heard in our lives, coming thru a million dollar system and utterly blowing our minds. What an INSANE sounding record!

No one in that room will ever forget it.

My complements to the chefs at Better Records for making this incredible experience possible.

Mike

Mike,

Wow, what a letter! Thanks for the demo. I can imagine it is quite a shock for these folks to hear a real record after so many Heavy Vinyl imposters. Hearing is believing, right?

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Another Bright and Harsh Led Zeppelin Title from Classic Records

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Led Zeppelin Available Now

Ridiculously bright and harsh, sounding nothing like the good pressings we sell.

We are proud to say this was one of the Classic Records Led Zeppelin releases that we never carried back when we were selling Heavy Vinyl (along with II and Houses, both of which stink to high heaven).

You will find very few critics of the Classic Zep LPs outside of those who work for Better Records, and even we used to recommend three of the Zep titles on Classic: Led Zeppelin I, IV and Presence.

Wrong on all counts. Live and learn, right?

Since then, we’ve made it a point to create debunking commentaries for some of the Classic Zeps, a public service of Better Records. We don’t actually like any of them now, although the first album is by far the best of the bunch.

Is this pressing of III the worst version of the album ever made?

There may be too much competition to make that claim – in our experience, most pressings of Zep records tend to be poorly mastered, barely hinting at how well recorded their albums really are — but it is certainly a record no audiophile should want anything to do with.

Here are a few commentaries you may care to read about Bernie Grundman‘s work as a mastering engineer, good and bad.

Every Top Copy of In Through the Out Door Must Pass This Test

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Led Zeppelin Available Now

In our review for this album, we debunked the Classic Records pressing using a very simple test which you may want to try at home.

The test we stumbled upon is actually quite an easy one to use.

A copy that makes you want to turn up the volume is likely to be a winner. The Classic does not pass that test.

We threw one on and just couldn’t deal with the edgy vocals and upper-midrange boost. We wanted to turn down the volume as quickly as we could get our hands on the knob. As far as we’re concerned there’s no substitute for The Real Thing. As hard as it is to find great sounding copies of this album, it’s even harder for us to sit through a sub-par version like the Classic.

And boy were our faces red. We used to think the Classic version was pretty decent, but the best originals SLAUGHTER it! We had never done a shootout for this album before 2007. We didn’t feel up to the challenge, because the typical pressing tends to be miserable — gritty, grainy, and hard sounding, with congested mids, dull up top, and on and on.

But 2007 turned out to be a milestone year for us here at Better Records.

Looking back on that year, the discovery of the Prelude Record Cleaning System, along with some system upgrades, allowed us to jump to the next level.

With better cleaning and more revealing and accurate playback, the Zeppelin shootout we conducted in 20o7 made it clear to us that the Classic was all sorts of wrong when played head to head against the best domestic pressings.

Try the Turn Up the Volume Test and see if your copy makes the grade, or makes you want to turn it right back down. I’m guessing the latter, unless you were lucky enough to get one of our Hot Stampers from the last shootout. There sure weren’t enough to go around.

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Letter of the Week – “You said ‘killer copy.’ Spot on! It is fantastic.”

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Led Zeppelin Available Now

One of our good customers had this to say about a Hot Stamper pressing of Houses of the Holy he purchased recently:

Hey Tom, 

Got the record. You said “killer copy.” Spot on! It is fantastic.

In addition to The Rain Song, Over the Hills and D’Yer Mak’er really amazed!

I definitely enjoyed the whole record though.

Thanks!

Sanjay

Sanjay,

Great news, glad to hear our records are sounding right to you, they sure sound right to us.

Enjoy. It will become more and more awesome sounding with every system upgrade. The Song Remains the Same is a tough test for any stereo.

TP

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Led Zeppelin – 2 Originals of Led Zeppelin

More of the Music of Led Zeppelin

This is a very old review from something like twenty years ago so take it with a very large grain of salt.

This is a Minty looking German Import Atlantic 2 LP set, consisting of Zep’s first two records. We dropped the needle on all four sides of this record and WOW! Side one of Zep II was SHOCKINGLY GOOD. Big bottom, lots of top, clean vocals — what more could you ask for? Our Rough Hot Stamper Grade: A+ or better. (Side two was more typical for this album, a bit recessed and flat. Oh well.)

On Zep I, again, side one was definitely the stand out. Very clean, punchy, smooth and sweet, and not smeary at all (which is unusual to say the least). Side two was a little midrangy and didn’t have the fullness and warmth that the best copies do.

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In Through The Out Door – Zep’s Last But Not Least

More of the Music of Led Zeppelin

One of our early shootouts taught us a lot about this album.

On a super transparent, super low distortion copy, all the subtleties really come to life.

Too many copies we played were a bit grainy — you could really hear it on the cymbal crashes. This copy is as smooth and sweet as you could ever ask for.

It’s open and spacious, and the vocals are tonally correct. The bottom end has deep, well-defined bass and an exceptionally punchy kick drum sound.

There’s lots of extension up top and a silky quality to the vocals and cymbals.

The presence is staggering — the guitar solo on All My Love positively JUMPS out of the speakers.

Musically this certainly isn’t Zep’s best work, but there is still some really great material.

We found the best sounding tracks to be “Fool In The Rain” on side one and “All My Love” on side two.

“In The Evening” can rock with the best of them, “South Bound Saurez” can be very rich and sweet, and “I’m Gonna Crawl” can sound out of this world.

In fact, after playing two knockout copies we found back to back, I am a bigger fan of this album than I ever was.

Zep II it ain’t, but it’s still Zep, and that oughta tell you plenty.

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Houses of the Holy – Our 4 Plus Shootout Winner from 2010

Hot Stamper Pressings of the Music of Led Zeppelin Available Now

Our lengthy commentary entitled outliers and out-of-this-world sound talks about how rare these kinds of pressings are and how to go about finding them.

We no longer give Four Pluses out as a matter of policy, but that doesn’t mean we don’t come across records that deserve them from time to time.

Side two of this copy of Houses of the Holy earned the rare Four Plus (A++++) grade (making it the first copy of Houses ever to do so, I believe) with an insane combination of clarity, presence, size, richness, transparency, bottom end punch and more. Side one is not quite in the same heady league but is certainly very strong with a Double Plus grade. You’re going to have a ridiculously hard time finding another copy that can hold its own against this one. Frankly, I don’t think it can be done without the kind of operation we have here! (more…)